š§ Listen to Sarah read this installment of Cured ā¤“
At our annual appointment, Dr. R asks how Iām doing. I went from weekly visits to monthly to bi-monthly to every few months, then every six months. Iāve since graduated to once a year.
Iām not sure what to say: Iām okay. Teaching is going well. I love my apartment. My familyās all healthy. I got a cat. Oh, and I totally healed from mental illness without telling you. And I wrote a book exposing the flaws in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Illness (DSM), psychiatryās bible, and psychiatric diagnoses, and youāre in it. How are you?
Instead, I tell him Iām doing really well.
He bobs his head the encouraging way he does. āGood. Good.ā
Gingerly, I tell him about getting an agent and selling the book. Even more gingerly, I explain that itās about my years in the mental health system. More gingerly still, I mention my research on the DSM. āBut Iām not anti-psychiatry. Not at all.ā
He bobs his head knowingly. āOh, yeah. The DSM? Itās just a mess. I tell my residents at the hospital, Donāt even go there. Stay in the real world. Itās a guide. Stay with your patient. Iām a biologist. I believe in science, but thatās not science.ā
We talk for some time. I ask him questions about his experience with it and how he uses it.
āWell, itās easy for me,ā he says. āI donāt take insurance, so I donāt need to tell my patients they have the worst disorder so I can get reimbursed.ā
His response to my book and honesty about the DSM fill me with trustāagain.
He says, āEvery medical resident should read your book, so they know what itās like to be on the other end of the DSM.ā
I want to tell him about my recovery. Instead, I stare out the window and become increasingly self-conscious. How am I āpresentingā? How do I seem to him? What diagnosis do I embody? Would someone whoās recovered from mental illness stare out the window? Maybe she would. Maybe she just did.
We sit without speaking. How can I prove Iāve recovered? I donāt have any data marking how well Iām āmanagingā my symptoms. Anxiety is still an abiding part of my existence. Sometimes, itās debilitating. Whirling dervishes of depression and darkness take hold. The sodden pit still comes. Thereās no avoiding them.
Emotions and thoughts arenāt easy to manage. I wish there were an āatlasā of emotions, but itās taken learning my bodily sensations and understanding which thoughts cause those sensations, and even then, Iām often puzzled because emotions donāt simply arise due to external events. Thereās affect and mood, the ways that physical health and equilibriumāhunger, tiredness, blood sugar level, level of caffeine and other stimulants, etc.ācreate emotional responses. Our evolutionarily driven thoughts trigger them too.
As evidence of my recovery, could I present the way my self-talk isnāt cruel anymore? What about how strong I feel because I paved my path to recovery? Or how I wake each morning with a sense of purpose because I know my book will someday help improve the mental health system by giving patients the information they need about diagnoses? Or how when Iām at home, I still occasionally stop mid-kitchen or mid-living room or out on the balcony, amazed that I live in such a beautiful apartment with a view?
Could I use as proof my lunches with my father and phone calls with my mother and visits with my sister and brother-in-law every Saturday at 4 pm to walk Augie? What about how incredible it felt to hear my nephew introduce me as his aunt and realize, Yes, Iām an aunt, not a diagnosis?
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